Look at the Book

Other people’s interests are our interests because other people’s interests are Christ’s interests.

Don’t be anxious about anything — except for this.

Many search for advanced steps for Bible reading but neglect a basic one: don’t skip over words. Here are three words in the Bible we cannot ignore.

The happiest people are happy when others are. The most mature love is the love that delights in others’ joy.

If God has placed others-oriented men and women in your life, he has done so expecting that, by his grace, you might imitate them.

Our love for God enflames when we see his beauty, remember his mercy, and feel his love.

The gospel begins with the phrase, “but God,” because we can’t love him on our own.

At the heart of saving faith is a love for God. But how can you know if you truly love him?

The delightful promises of Scripture are for those who love him — and no one else.

You were not made for laziness. Many people struggle with sexual immorality because they sit around when they shouldn’t.

Our greatest weapon against lust is joy in God. Our happiness in him gives us what we need to obtain lasting victory in the war for our souls.

The war will be lost against lust by those who stop fighting it by the power and promises of God.

Saying no to lust is not enough. We must turn to a superior pleasure — the everlasting pleasure of knowing our God.

Lust will kill you unless you deal it a death blow first. You usually have five seconds to act.

The first step to fighting lust is one too many are unwilling to make — avoid it.

Few things have destroyed more marriages, stolen more joy, or strangled more souls than lust. Do you know how to fight it?

If we lose everything but gain Christ, we’ve lost nothing.

When we finally see the Lord face to face, we want to hear, “Well done good and faithful servant,” not, “Your labor was in vain.”

God doesn’t want his secret to contentment to stay secret. He wrote it plainly in a book.

When we set aside grumbling and complaining during hard times and take up joy in the Lord, a watching world sees stars shining in a dark world.

If you conquer this sin, James says you’ll be perfect, Paul says blameless, innocent, and without blemish. But it’s one of the hardest to conquer.

Our grumbling is not insignificant to God. When we choose contentment in the Lord over complaining, we shine as lights in the world.

The Bible is like no other book in the history of the world. Man wrote it, but God spoke it.

Bible studies are weakened because few believe that there are right and wrong interpretations of the Bible.

God’s word alone will stand forever. From age to age, country to country, and reader to reader, God’s truth, as revealed in Scripture, remains the same.

Those who come to a text without humility will only leave with their opinions. Those who come to the Bible to learn will leave with God’s truth.

Pride opens the Bible and reads without reading. Humility opens the Bible and asks God to give insight.

It is considered rude when we interrupt someone while they are speaking and tell them what they really mean. We must not do this to authors either.

Great Bible study isn’t about being able to articulate how you think or feel about a text. The meaning of a text is defined by the author, not the reader.

If you use God’s sovereignty as an excuse for passivity and laziness towards your sin, you may not be his child.

Satan works day and night to blind us to the fact that God’s children are never alone in their fight against sin.

Salvation is rooted in the past, worked out in the present, and guaranteed in the future.

If God justifies us by grace alone through faith alone, what does it mean to work out our salvation?

Obedience is neither the rock upon which our salvation rests nor the optional ribbon placed upon eternal life. It is essential. And it is empowered by God.

To comply with God’s commands is to believe that God knows more than we do about what will ultimately make us happy.

Christian self-denial is not truly self-denial. It is saying “no” to the lesser and impermanent for the better “yes” of eternity.

God doesn’t help us in our times of need so that we will keep it to ourselves. He comforts us so we can bring comfort to others.

God promises rest for the weary, peace for the brokenhearted, and comfort for the restless. Do you know the God of all comfort?

Christ’s work on the cross and subsequent resurrection not merely shows that he loved humanity. It proclaims that God loves his glory.

You have two options when it comes to Christ: submit to him joyfully now and gain your life, or submit to him begrudgingly later and lose it.

You may not bow to him now. You may not bow to him next year. But a day draws near when every knee will bow before Jesus Christ.

Jesus ascended from earth to heaven, from lowliness to a throne, from humiliation to exaltation, from a cross to a crown.

The Father and the Son were not in a Civil War to redeem humanity. They were in perfect harmony. The Father sent; the Son gladly went.

God did not become an angel to save angels. But he did become fully human to save humans.

If you see Jesus like you do Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, or Confucius, you do not know Jesus.

Many are willing to share in Christlikeness only as long as it doesn’t mean sacrifice. But Christlikeness led Christ to the cross.

Happiness that is not permanent is not a joy that is truly satisfying.

When you see horrendous crimes committed without adequate justice served, remember, the wicked will perish before the judgment of God.

“Righteousness” has a double meaning in the New Testament. Do you know what those meanings are?

In all things, Christians prosper, because over all things, Christ reigns.